Panic, Worry and Chaos

One day it’s the overwrought prose of this week’s Joe Bruno profile, and the next, a story so bad it looks like it was written by a fifth grader.

Case in point, a hilarious story I read this morning titled Vehicle strikes Colonie tavern; apparent burn victim. Who could resist a story with such a puzzling headline? Readers were rewarded with passages like this:

Steve Cheslow, a Times Union employee who was at the tavern, said he heard “a big boom.” One man was rolling on the ground. Everyone was concerned about the cook in the kitchen. There was panic, worry and chaos, and everyone was told to get out, he said.

You can read the whole thing here; I saved a PDF because this story won’t last long on the website before being cleaned up or deleted. On the up side, we are offered some interesting details:

“It just went ‘poof!'” said patron John Ashley, who was with his wife. He said he tried to get the man to safety. The fire happened during the popular karaoke night.

Well, no need to worry about the radio stations swiping this story and reading it on the air. For them it would need too much re-writing.